


Going Home

by unknowableroom_archivist



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-07-09
Updated: 2007-07-09
Packaged: 2019-01-19 10:41:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,951
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12408789
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/unknowableroom_archivist/pseuds/unknowableroom_archivist
Summary: He spent months avoiding the house after their death, but after graduating he couldn't put it off any longer. It's time for James to return home.





	Going Home

**Author's Note:**

> Note from ChristyCorr, the archivist: this story was originally archived at [Unknowable Room](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Unknowable_Room), a Harry Potter archive active from 2005-2016. To preserve the archive, I began manually importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project after May 2017. I e-mailed all creators about the move and posted announcements, but may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this creator, please contact me using the e-mail address on [Unknowable Room collection profile](http://www.archiveofourown.org/collections/unknowableroom).

It was ironic, their deaths. In a time so desolate, in a time filled with such fear and cruelty, it was ironic—so very, very ironic—that they died doing something they loved. Not defending the world, not single-handedly battling Death Eaters on a lonesome alley somewhere, not even rescuing a cat from a bloody tree, but traveling. It was like tradition. Once they were both officially retired in my second year, they’d taken up traveling. They wanted to see all of  Europe , the muggle way. I, personally, didn’t understand it. To me, it seemed dumb, and I’d told them so on several occasions. They were both nearly a hundred years old; they’d seen _all_ of  Europe ,  Asia and even the  Americas . I remembered Dad saying something about how that had been apparating, on business or this or that. I had rolled my eyes and finished packing my trunk. 

They’d deviated off course. Of course. I couldn’t really have expecting them to stay on it, after all, it’s _my_ mum and dad, and _I’d_ one to stick to the plans, just ask anyone. I’d learned it from them. They were supposed to have been in  Greece . Supposed to. When I got that owl, the one I don’t like to think about, it said they were in  Cameroon on a safari. A _safari_. _Them._ I remember laughing and sharing it with my mates, going on about how ridiculous they must look in their safari hats and their khaki trousers. They’d said they’d see me at Christmas and sent their love and all that. I’d stuffed the letter in my trunk and completely forgotten about it. There had been a full moon two nights later. My mum and dad and their safari was completely wiped from my mind. 

Two weeks later, I received another letter. Usually, no one ever wrote me save for my mum and dad. Occasionally, I’d receive a letter addressed to both Sirius and myself from the Prewetts, but usually it was from my mum and dad. The letter I received that day—the eleventh of December, breakfast, of course—was neither in my mum’s loopy script or the Prewetts’ usual print. It was a stately looking letter with a large Ministry of Magic emblem on the outside, and a Ministry letterhead on the letter. I don’t remember what it said exactly, but I’ll give you the general gist. 

‘Sorry, James, old chum, you’ve been orphaned.’

They’d promised me Christmas. 

To be blunt, the funeral sucked. I don’t know if you’ve ever been to your mum and dad’s funeral, but I don’t wish it on anyone, not even Severus Snape. I didn’t cry. By then I was through with tears. Done. I’d cried enough the day I’d gotten the letter, the following few days… I hated that I didn’t cry. I hated even more that everyone gave me sympathetic looks and pats and hair ruffles and told me that Charles and Henrietta were ‘great people’ and ‘it’s a shame they’re gone’ and on and on like that. Like that would help. 

Sirius cried. Sirius cried like a baby. He tried to be secretive about it. He didn’t want me to see him cry when I so obviously couldn’t. He’d hid his face in Remus’s shoulder and cried and cried and Remus patted him sympathetically, and I think that comforted him. Remus cried too. _Remus_ cried, and I couldn’t muster up a single tear. Peter didn’t cry, but I think he was trying not to for my sake. His eyes were more watery than usual. 

I was supposed to this then. I was supposed to take a week off from school and go get things in order. That’s what Dumbledore had said. Dumbledore had been the only person not to tell me that he was sorry and that my parents were great people and that it was meant to be. He told me that it was okay to be sad and that I had as long off of school as I wanted. I took off a week, and holidays followed shortly after. 

They’d promised me Christmas. 

I cried then. 

The week I took off from school, I was supposed to go home. I was supposed to read the will and have everything taken care of. I didn’t. I was going to, I really was, but I couldn’t. Instead, I locked myself up in the Heads’ dormitory and hid. It was easier that way. I cried. The entire week, I stayed in that room and cried. They knew where I was, obviously. I told them I was leaving to go home, but they knew. They had the Map. Even without the Map, I’m sure they knew. They always knew. 

It’s July now. 

I kept putting it off. I didn’t go during that week because it was too soon. I didn’t go during hols because… they’d promised me Christmas. I didn’t go in January because it was a new term. I didn’t go in February because, despite my best efforts, I was starting to feel happy again. I didn’t go in March because it was Remus’s birthday. I didn’t go in April because it was Peter’s birthday. I didn’t go in May because it was _my_ birthday. I didn’t go in June because we had NEWTs. I put it off, and put it off, and put it off, and now here I stand, the once friendly house at number one Godric’s Hollow standing ominously before me. 

I can’t move, I can’t breathe, I can’t _think_. Behind me, they all stand silently, waiting for me to do it. Waiting for me to step up onto the porch and open the door to an empty house. There would be no Henrietta rushing out to greet me like she’d always done before. There would be no Charles sitting by the fire waiting to say “Alright, Jim?” when I walked in and dumped down my trunk. As stupid, as childish, as… not James Potter as it seems, I just want my mum and dad. I want them to be there, I want so desperately for the past few months to have just been a dream and that I was going to wake up any moment now back in my dorm room on that—

“You’ve got to do it, mate,” a voice behind me says gruffly. Sirius. He’s crying again. Remus, Peter, and even Lily, who’d never even _met_ my parents, are too. I stare at them all briefly, taking them all in as if this was the first time I’d ever seen them. And it was then that I realize that I’m crying too. These four, they’re here with me, just as scared as I am, and yet there they are. I want tell them I love them. I want to thank them, but instead, I wipe at my face desperately and take my first step towards the house, suddenly feeling significantly braver than I had just moments before. I brace for impact and take another step. No one behind me moves, and I finish the distance between me and the house. 

Standing on the porch now, I feel my bravery completely disappear and I think of running. I think of running away as quickly as possible and never looking back. I don’t need to go in this house. I don’t need to see it empty with no Henrietta and no Charles—no Mum and Dad. I throw a look over my shoulder, and they are still there in tears, whispering now that I’m out of earshot, but all looking to me with those blasted looks of encouragement. A shiver runs down my spine, and I reach for my wand to unlock the door. Another shiver and the door is unlocked. 

The impulse to run is beating so hard into my skull that my hands begin to shake and my knees begin to wobble. I stand there, shaking and wishing to wake up and shaking more, staring at the doorknob but unable to reach for it and open the door for fear of what lay ahead of me. 

But what am I so afraid of? Where’s my bloody Gryffindor spirit? Along side the fear, I feel anger boiling in the pit of my stomach. Anger for the circumstances, anger at my parents, anger at myself, anger at the bloody doorknob for being so easily unlocked, anger at my own stupidity. My fear. Behind me, my friends are moving. They were coming toward me, to give me encouragement. I want to tell them to stop, not to come up on the porch, but my mouth refuses to work. Instead, I do the only thing I can think of to escape them and I throw open the door. 

For a moment, I’m completely still taking in the house. Everything is exactly the same. I don’t know what I was expecting, but this isn’t it. I wasn’t expecting the post to be on the table where they’d left it, I wasn’t expecting the sofa to be in the same place, I wasn’t expecting Dad’s pipe to be sitting on the table next to the fireplace, I wasn’t expecting it all to be the _same._ If I’m completely honest, and completely stupid, I admit I was expecting _them_. Even though I’d seen them buried and I’d seen their dead bodies in the caskets before they were lowered into the graves. I’d _seen_ it and yet I was still expecting to see them here. 

Before I even realized, my knees give out and I’m crumpled up on the floor, hot tears streaming down my face again. Footsteps in the doorway tell me that they’ve all joined me, but I don’t get up. I don’t know, I just cry and wish that I’d just wake up and I wish that I could just _accept_ this and I wish I wasn’t so foolish as to believe that my parents were coming back from the dead and I wish that I could just grow up. 

I feel a small hand on my back and I look up to see Lily on the ground beside me. Behind her Sirius, Remus, and Peter stand, waiting on me. Lily is looking at me so warmly that I’ve stopped crying. She throws her arms around me before I have a second to think and she’s whispering “I love you” over and over and over again and I don’t know if I should, but I feel better. She loves me. She’s still here with me. She hasn’t gone. She’s still here. She _loves_ me.

“I love you, too,” I whisper back into her hair, closing my eyes and holding onto her as if my life depends on it. She holds back and I feel better. My fear is ebbing away. She loves me, I love her, and we’re here. My parents may be gone, but we’re here. I open my eyes and look up at my three best mates standing there waiting for me. And they’re here, too. I’ve never appreciated the three of them more than I do at this moment, as they stand here, tears welling in their eyes and smiles across all their faces. 

“Thanks,” I tell them, releasing my hold on Lily. Sirius nods foolishly and I feel a wave of comfort wash over me. Despite my parents’ death, despite the fact that we’re standing in my parents’ empty house, despite the fact that the lot of us a blubbering like babies, Sirius Black is still unchanged, a grinning fool that has been my best mate for seven years. I could kiss him. Instead, I repeat my thanks and we all allow a small, watery laugh. __

__

 


End file.
